April 2015

April 30, 2015

Socialist is a near cussword in US politics. The independent Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders gives it unusual dignity. More power to him. It is not everyday that an avowed socialist runs as a presidential candidate in America. It is also not everyday that a mainline politician says the following as quoted in The Guardian:

“What we have seen is that while the average person is working longer hours for lower wages, we have seen a huge increase in income and wealth inequality, which is now reaching obscene levels.”

“This is a rigged economy, which works for the rich and the powerful, and is not working for ordinary Americans … You know, this country just does not belong to a handful of billionaires.”

Sanders, known for his unambiguous assertions about the direction in which US politics has been going for decades now, will bring to the presidential race a refreshing candor of the kind one rarely hears. What we often see are manufactured centrists or unabashed rightists. Not that there is anything inherently wrong with either if they manage to weave in the larger good of ordinary people in their worldview. Something tells me it is not possible.

Sanders is at best a curiosity in US politics, the core of whose political ideology does resonate within a large section of American people. It is just that they are coy about coming out as socialists. Much of what happens in America by way of social security is an essential manifestation of socialist thinking but there is a weird reluctance to acknowledge it.

With Sanders injecting himself into the Democratic Party’s primaries, the presidential has suddenly become rather interesting. Unlike the popularly viewed fait accompli candidacy of Hillary Rodham Clinton, Sanders has had a clear record of doing precisely what he says. There are enough bombastic right wingers from the Republican side. What we need is at least one bombastic socialist. We have one now in Sanders. In his case what you see is what you get.

It is different story, of course, whether Sanders’ candidacy would go far in a system that is now unapologetically plutocratic. Notwithstanding that it is always good to have someone who wants to dismantle the status quo.

April 29, 2015

Congress Party vice president Rahul Gandhi in parliament (Photo: A frame from LSTV)

Let me put it out there unambiguously. I am an admirer of political cheap shots. That is because they are in the very nature of politics. Political cheap shots have a way of driving home whatever message that the one taking them is seeking to. To that extent, one is witnessing the emergence of a remade Rahul Gandhi these days in the aftermath of his much commented upon Vipassana retreat.

Of course, it is ironic that Rahul is rediscovering his ability to articulate political lamentations after his Vipassana retreat, one of whose objectives is to overcome lamentation. I am consciously stretching the meaning of lamentation here to make a silly point.

What has prompted the post this morning his Rahul’s short speech—he is getting used to making parliamentary speeches, isn’t he?—in parliament on Wednesday. While talking about the daily existential challenges of farmers and laborers, Gandhi found a perfect segue to take a reasonably effective cheap shot at Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The broader reference, fraught with political consequence for the Modi government, is to the issue of aggressive land acquisition policy that the government is trying to pursue. Rahul and his young team in the diminished Congress Party have found a potentially powerful political lifeline in this issue and they are doing their best to exploit it. To that end, if it means taking frequent cheap shots at Prime Minister Modi, no stranger to taking political cheap shots himself throughout his career, so be it.

I have always watched politics in general and Indian parliamentary sessions as a spectator sport. There is tremendous free fun is to be had here. Even a trivial aside such as Lok Sabha (Upper House) Speaker Sumitra Mahajan instructing an unruly Member of Parliament from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands saying “Please, please Andaman-Nicobar baithiye” is entertaining for me.

April 26, 2015

As I return to Chicago after a nearly three-month long trip to shoot a documentary about Narsinh Mehta (‘Gandhi’s Song’), it is fitting that it ends on that very song ‘Vaishnav Jan To.’ I was at a luncheon yesterday where I met a fellow journalist and now friend Mohan Sivanand, who also happens to be editor-at-large of Reader’s Digest. During the course of our conversation Mehta and ‘Vaishnav Jan To’ came up rather effortlessly.

Mohan told me that he was always fascinated by the song to which he was exposed early on in his life. This was despite the fact that Mohan did not know what language it was in. It was only later that he discovered it was in Gujarati. As the editor of a widely read and popular magazine Mohan has a powerful platform in Reader’s Digest whose Indian edition maintains its traditional family format. In its ‘Words of Lasting Interest Section’ the digest features writers and philosophers of substance and consequence. Last year, to mark the 145th birth anniversary of Mohandas Gandhi, the digest carried Mehta’s ‘Vaishnav Jan To’ with its rather essential English translation.

What I like about this little interaction with Mohan is how, ever since I started the documentary project, ‘Vaishnav Jan To’ has popped up in conversations so organically and how so many people have their own unique vantage point on it. It is just as well that what began as ‘Gandhi’s Song’ is ending with it.

April 25, 2015

Moments before noon yesterday sitting in my brother Trilochan’s 12th floor Mumbai apartment I felt a slight but weird swaying. It was north-south swaying to be precise because my back was facing north. Since I had just taken my blood pressure medication, it couldn’t have been a case of high blood pressure. Then it happened again, this time way more distinct and elemental. It seemed to be come from something deep down in Earth even though it felt as if it was emanating from my own body. One knew it had to be an earthquake and a big one somewhere far.

Moments later I went to the website of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and tracked its global map in the South Asian region. Sure enough a red dot had come up on Nepal. Early figures from the USGS said it was a 7.5 magnitude one on the Richter scale, which is a truly significant seismic event. It was later revised to 7.9 which is even more lethal. That figure is equivalent of 10–15 megatons of TNT explosion in terms of its energy release. The weird swaying that I felt was a result of this energy rippling through the ground deep below me in Earth’s crust. That explains why it felt so primal. The instability one felt was existential.

Of course, it passed quickly in a few seconds for me but for the people of Nepal it turned out to be devastating. There have been quakes much greater than this one around the world and more destructive of life and property. The 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake, for instance, which caused a massive wave of tsunami and killed some 230,000 people in 14 countries was 9.2 on the Richter scale. According to the USGS, magnitude 8.5 to 8.9 quakes happen 0.3 times a year. That makes 9.2 off the charts. Quakes of 7.5 to 7.9 happen 3.1 times a year which make them relatively common but still deadly.

While I am on the subject, let me add that the USGS says earthquakes can occur anywhere between Earth’s surface and about 700 kilometers deep down. Those happening up to 70 kilometers and above are considered shallow. The one in Nepal happened at the depth about 12 kilometers which is rather shallow.

April 24, 2015

Farmer Gajendra Singh who committed suicide at a political rally in New Delhi. (Photo: A frame from India TV)

One is tempted to think that what is playing out in India’s capital these days is apocryphal. It appears to be real but it could well be not.Even I, a veteran of long years in hard-boiled field journalism, have to keep telling myself that it is indeed real and tragically so.

A young farmer hangs himself from a tree on the sidelines of a rally by a political party claiming to be the most passionate guardians of the ordinary folk. The very public suicide by Gajendra Singh seemed like a macabre prop except that it was not and was, in fact, tragically real.

The reasons behind his suicide are not clear to me since there are conflicting media reports. Some say he was traumatized by the prospects of an impending crop failure due to unseasonal rains but his father Bane Singh has been quoted as saying by The Indian Express, “What will one do with all the compensation? We are a reasonably well to do family and Gajendra was anything but distressed.” It would be foolish for me to hold forth on the reasons behind his death.

That the suicide occurred in the thick of a highly fractious debate on the question of the Narendra Modi government’s proposed new land acquisition bill has only served to vitiate the atmosphere. It is possible that Singh’s death may not necessarily have anything to do with the recriminations over land acquisition but in the kind of atmosphere that prevails in Delhi it has only made the debate more intractable.

Add to all this the seeming apathy of the people attending the rally organized by New Delhi city state’s ruling Aam Aadmi Party and you have a lethal political mix. Ashutosh, a former television news anchor turned motor-mouth spokesman of the AAP, sobbed on live TV while defending charges that somehow his party was responsible for Singh’s suicide. A part of the reason why people are leveling those charges is because despite the suicide the AAP leaders continued their rally, constituting terrible optics that suggested they wanted to gain politically from the drama. AAP founder-chief and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal later apologized but not to much avail.

It is almost as if real life has taken a fictional turn in its course in the capital. Even reporting the story the way it precisely is comes across as improbable. There are just too many dramatic hooks in the story apart from the suicide itself which alone would have been more than unsettling. I hesitate to comment on the goings-on other than recording my very basic view. India produces far too many emblems of its extraordinarily eccentric news cycle. Singh is only the latest example of that.

April 23, 2015

April 22, 2015

The scarves bearing my digital artworks have arrived and it feels like I have crossed the threshold between the virtual and real. Instead of the expected 10 I have received six, all of which I have displayed here. The idea is to explore new survival avenues even as I continue to pursue my main profession of journalism and content creation.

As soon as I began digital painting three years ago it was clear to me that the artworks could effortlessly lend themselves to merchandizing apart from their intended purpose of being actually framed paintings hanging other than in my home. Now that the scarves have actually materialized I see many more distinct possibilities.

The early reaction has been surprisingly upbeat and if that is any sign selling them may not be so hard. Here are the other five scarves. My original paintings are inset for your reference. They are not part of the scarves, of course.

April 21, 2015

As I await the delivery later today of the first ten silk and cotton scarves that carry my artworks, I wonder whether it is the start of a minor side career. Some of the ten scarves have been pre-ordered by generous friends. As returns from print journalism dwindle to near nothing one has got to find ways to survive with a measure of dignity. And what is more dignified than silk scarves and stoles?

Looking at the websites of leading fashion houses such as Gucci, YSL, Chanel and others I could not discern a trend other than finding that silk georgette is the chosen fabric. I suppose that has long been the case. In any case my artworks have no discernible pattern, which is a good thing. I am hoping someone somewhere might notice my line and feel intrigued enough to source enough numbers for me to pay monthly bills.

Not even remotely being an artist, I position myself as an efficient hack who has some ability to work up colors digitally.The entire purpose of the artworks is to create a quick revenue source. Just in case they become a fashion rage all the 10 regular readers of this blog will get a one-time discount.

April 20, 2015

Despite its predictability, Rahul Gandhi’s characterization of the Narendra Modi government as a “suit-boot ki sarkar’ (A government for the suited and shod) has the potential to politically resonate and eventually stick on constituencies that often decide elections.

Gandhi’s parliamentary intervention, which was watched with some anticipation because it was coming in the immediate aftermath of his much commented upon two-month sabbatical, may have been short on verbal flourish that Prime Minister Modi creates so effortlessly but it had the virtue of being amenable to the right political constituents.

Never mind the irony that among the most enthusiastic endorsers of Gandhi’s intervention about a “suit-boot ki sarkar” was a scion of a once major princely family, namely Jyotiraditya Scindia. However, that by itself does not cancel the intrinsic merit of speaking up for the country’s hundreds of millions of farmers and marginal farm workers. The Modi government could dismiss the import of Gandhi’s assertion at some political peril. There is a reason why the government is not taking the core political messaging of Rahul’s intervention lightly.

What the greatly diminished Congress Party in parliament is doing is slowly chipping away at what it perceives to be a crack in the Modi citadel on the question of land acquisition which directly affects hundreds of millions of farmers and farm workers.It is easy for the urbanized political constituents of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to make light of rural India but political parties know that they cannot be for just urban Indians. The sheer rural numbers are staggering. Over 65 percent of Indians are engaged in agriculture and they vote with grudge and gumption.

It was apparent that the sabbatical has done Rahul good but that cannot become a routine of his life. It seems that the route to a personal political revival for Gandhi passes through India’s farmlands. He may have found the issue on which he can safely peg his political life for now. People hold on to their lands almost as dearly as they hold on to their lives. To that extent, by giving it a clear representation at the national level Rahul may have found his own source of rejuvenation.

Of course, these are early days and it is always possible that such a strategy might come undone in the months and years ahead. However, for now Rahul is staggering up to stand and fight. His oratory is still fractured and devoid of the kind of panache that the prime minister works up on a daily basis. At some point panache would have exhausted its returns.

April 19, 2015

In a remarkable case of rewarding reckless behavior,Chinese President Xi Jinping arrives in Pakistan today loaded with assistance worth $46 billion. It seems chronic instability and violence make for an excellent model for economic development.

Jane Perlez of The New York Times reports that Xi’s visit is expected to yield bilateral accords between the two countries worth $46 billion that cover roads, rails and power plants. As the newspaper also points out and as has been known to those of us who follow the region, one of Beijing’s main concerns is the ferment in Xinjiang bordering Pakistan and Afghanistan. Perlez reports, “Now, as China faces growing restiveness in Xinjiang, which has borders with Pakistan and Afghanistan, Beijing is attempting to help stem the flow of radicalism into its own backyard by bolstering development in perhaps the most vulnerable part of Pakistan.”

What this essentially boils down to is that important powers such as the United States and China would throw large sums of money at Pakistan, notwithstanding its failure to rein in radicalized groups, in the guise of economic assistance in the fond hope that things might change. I am not yet cynical enough to say that this model of getting international assistance, whereby the state at the very least encourages such radicalism by not actively discouraging it, is something that Pakistan is becoming addicted to. It is obvious that there are several layers of state failure, one of which happens to be acquiescence by elements of the Pakistani establishment.

That said, if China’s generous assistance, even if motivated by self-serving objectives in Xinjiang, helps Pakistan push away from its current course, then in the long run it might be good for the region and the world. Of course, India is bound to see such deep economic engagement between its two old foes as seriously problematic. However, this deserves to be given time, at least enough for it to succeed or fail.

The $46 billion package is expected to pan out for the next 15 years of infrastructure building. This is a long enough timeline for China to ensure that Pakistan commits to the kind of behavior becoming of such assistance. In the process, if it becomes a progressively responsible state, then I suppose it benefits India in some significant ways. There will be strategic consequences for India by having China so deeply involved in the affairs of its immediate neighbor but it is what it is and New Delhi will have to find a way to extract a maximum strategic return on the Chinese investment.